Links 7/25/2024

Kansas biologists find ‘super rare’ threatened species in the mouth of a hungry toad KSNT (RK).

11 Extraordinary Sharks That Live in Deep Sea Waters ZME Science

How private equity tangled banks in a web of debt FT. Commentary: Private Equity Puts Debt Everywhere Matt Levine, Bloomberg.

Private Equity Gets Creative to Buy Time for More Gains. Clients Say Pay Me Now Bloomberg

Private equity is devouring the economy as boomer entrepreneurs exit—but a new approach to employee ownership can change that Fortune

Climate

High Wet Bulb Globe Temperature Danger Arctic News

What It Feels Like When You Have Heatstroke Outside

Trees reveal climate surprise: Microbes living in bark remove methane from the atmosphere Phys.org

Syndemics

2024 Paris Olympics hit by early COVID cases, but organizers don’t seem worried by risk of major outbreak CBS. Commentary:

More commentary:

China?

China aims to step up Russian energy cooperation despite US sanctions calls South China Morning Post

Sold A False Dream: Inside China’s Derelict Housing Developments China Spotlight

Why Is Bangladesh On The Boil? Free Press Journal

Commentary: Bangladeshi students revolt, but wider movement against the government looks unlikely Channel News Asia

Myanmar

Myanmar Is Running Out of Gas. What Happens Next? The Diplomat

Mourning James C. Scott, a Sterling anarchist and friend of Myanmar Frontier Myanmar

Espionage and Sabotage: The Truth About the Ninja Nippon.com

The Great Game

U.S. military representative will serve as an advisor in Armenia’s Ministry of Defense JAM News

Syraqistan

Highlights: Netanyahu addresses Congress (video) Politico. Commentary:

Total: 58.

Netanyahu urges unity, but stirs a firestorm inside and outside Capitol The Hill. Commentary:

More Commentary:

Watergate Hotel sanitized after maggots released to protest Netanyahu stay The Hill. Commentary (2020):

* * *

How Israel is shrinking Gaza’s ‘safe zones’ Al Jazeera

‘Soldiers! Soldiers! Soldiers!’ The Floutist

Gaza as a Blurred, Empty World in an Israeli Reservist’s Paintings Haaretz

* * *

An Untold History of Joe Biden’s Support for Israel Branko Marcetic, In These Times

New Not-So-Cold War

War in Ukraine: ‘Russia is advancing, but it’s a matter of infantry advancement, not a war of movement’ Le Monde

Ukraine War Map Shows Two Battalions at Risk of Encirclement: ‘Alarming’ Newsweek

SITREP 7/24/24: General Syrsky Shocks With News of Russian Armor and Troop Surges Simplicius the Thinker

* * *

Fitch downgrades Ukraine’s rating to ‘C’ Anadolu Agency

EU discusses indefinite freezing of Russian assets to secure G7 loan for Ukraine Ukrainska Pravda

Ukrainians strip out Tesla batteries to keep the lights on FT

* * *

War in Ukraine: Can China use its clout to play peacemaker? Deutsche Welle

What one Moscow square says about Russia’s worsening relations with West BBC

Winds of Change: Ukrainian Politics Reacts to the US Electoral Drama The Wilson Center

* * *

Rheinmetall officially receives order from Ukraine to build ammunition factory Ukrainska Pravda

* * *

NATO Grapples With a New Long Game Against Putin Foreign Policy

The NATO Declaration and the Deadly Strategy of Neoconservatism Jeffrey Sachs, Common Dreams

Biden Administration

FAA Launches Audit of Southwest Airlines After Close Calls WSJ

2024

Joe Biden says he is ‘passing the torch’ to save US democracy FT

Biden sidesteps hard truths in first speech since quitting race BBC

The Wreckage Biden Leaves Patrick Lawrence, Consortium News

Our Famously Free Press

When mainstream media swallows consultancy garbage Terry’s Substack

Digital Watch

CrowdStrike fiasco highlights growing Sino-Russian tech independence The Register

* * *

AI models collapse when trained on recursively generated data Nature. From the Abstract: “We find that indiscriminate use of model-generated content in training causes irreversible defects in the resulting models, in which tails of the original content distribution disappear. We refer to this effect as ‘model collapse’ and show that it can occur in LLMs as well as in variational autoencoders (VAEs) and Gaussian mixture models (GMMs). We build theoretical intuition behind the phenomenon and portray its ubiquity among all learned generative models. We demonstrate that it must be taken seriously if we are to sustain the benefits of training from large-scale data scraped from the web.” Autocoprophagy, as I have said since the beginning of the AI bubble.

OpenAI training and inference costs could reach $7bn for 2024, AI startup set to lose $5bn – report Data Center Dynamics

VCs are still pouring billions into generative AI startups Tech Crunch

Boeing

Boeing Gets Flurry of Orders at International Airshow WSJ

Boeing not yet facing clear skies in China even as deliveries resume, executive visits South China Morning Post

US files details of Boeing’s plea deal related to plane crashes. It’s in the hands of a judge now AP

The Final Frontier

Mercury has a layer of diamond 10 miles thick, NASA spacecraft finds Space.com

Supply Chain

Two Swiss lawyers take aim at flags of convenience in new book Splash 247

Groves of Academe

What’s a University Worth? (excerpt) Doomberg

Imperial Collapse Watch

Loss of empire, loss of lucidity Pearls and Irritations

Fa-Fa-Fa-Fa-Fashion

Amazon’s foray into ultra-fast fashion will be a seismic shift in e-commerce Fashion United

Class Warfare

Americans are falling behind on their car payments FOX

39% of Americans worry they can’t pay the bills CNN

The era of privatisation is nearly over. But cleaning up the mess left behind will take years Guardian

At The Money: Behavior Beats Intelligence (transcript) The Big Picture

US markets suffer worst day since 2022 as Tesla and AI stocks fall FT

Antidote du jour (Biscutella):

See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.

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About Lambert Strether

Readers, I have had a correspondent characterize my views as realistic cynical. Let me briefly explain them. I believe in universal programs that provide concrete material benefits, especially to the working class. Medicare for All is the prime example, but tuition-free college and a Post Office Bank also fall under this heading. So do a Jobs Guarantee and a Debt Jubilee. Clearly, neither liberal Democrats nor conservative Republicans can deliver on such programs, because the two are different flavors of neoliberalism (“Because markets”). I don’t much care about the “ism” that delivers the benefits, although whichever one does have to put common humanity first, as opposed to markets. Could be a second FDR saving capitalism, democratic socialism leashing and collaring it, or communism razing it. I don’t much care, as long as the benefits are delivered. To me, the key issue — and this is why Medicare for All is always first with me — is the tens of thousands of excess “deaths from despair,” as described by the Case-Deaton study, and other recent studies. That enormous body count makes Medicare for All, at the very least, a moral and strategic imperative. And that level of suffering and organic damage makes the concerns of identity politics — even the worthy fight to help the refugees Bush, Obama, and Clinton’s wars created — bright shiny objects by comparison. Hence my frustration with the news flow — currently in my view the swirling intersection of two, separate Shock Doctrine campaigns, one by the Administration, and the other by out-of-power liberals and their allies in the State and in the press — a news flow that constantly forces me to focus on matters that I regard as of secondary importance to the excess deaths. What kind of political economy is it that halts or even reverses the increases in life expectancy that civilized societies have achieved? I am also very hopeful that the continuing destruction of both party establishments will open the space for voices supporting programs similar to those I have listed; let’s call such voices “the left.” Volatility creates opportunity, especially if the Democrat establishment, which puts markets first and opposes all such programs, isn’t allowed to get back into the saddle. Eyes on the prize! I love the tactical level, and secretly love even the horse race, since I’ve been blogging about it daily for fourteen years, but everything I write has this perspective at the back of it.

48 comments

  1. Antifa

    Trump’s too uncouth for the empire
    They prefer war sounds sweet, like a church choir
    The difference, I guess
    Is Trump had a near miss—
    He’s now been on the wrong end of gunfire

    An old man with orange on his face
    Overdue for Death’s gentle embrace
    Trump won’t die from a bullet
    But a KFC pullet—
    That will be his deep-fried coop de grace

    Trump is five-foot-ten two-eighty-five pounds
    He devours Big Macs, making animal sounds
    On his stone epitaph
    He will leave us a laugh—
    ‘Stay one step ahead of the hounds’

    Some are intrigued by his wealth
    Some by his cunning and stealth
    Big Macs and fried chicken
    And his fat finger lickin’
    Leaves me oh so concerned for his health

    JD Vance sees his chance through succession
    ‘A heartbeat away’ is the expression
    Donald lying in state
    Well-coiffed and sedate
    Means two terms reward JD’s discretion

    Reply
    1. Samuel Conner

      Thank you.

      It is probably a mistake to credit D Party leaders with this much foresight, but it’s an amusing thought that JRB’s infirmities might actually turn out to be politically useful to the Party, inasmuch as they have elicited, prior to JRB’s withdrawal from the 2024 race, a significant amount of negative commentary from DJT which can now be turned against him, since he will be older than JRB now is by the end of a 2025-2029 term.

      Perhaps this is a subtext of the apparent irritation that JRB is no longer the top-of-ticket punching bag. “Oh sh!t! Now I’m the oldest candidate in history!”

      Probably they don’t think this far ahead and it’s simply a case of moldy lemons turning out to make surprisingly palatable lemonade.

      I wonder whether the D Party powers will pressure JRB into taking a comprehensive cognitive assessment (calling DJT’s bluff) and use that as grounds to install Harris as POTUS.

      I do think that this kind of assessment is a good idea for POTUS candidates. Perhaps a new normal is in view.

      Reply
  2. JohnA

    Re What one Moscow square says about Russia’s worsening relations with West BBC

    I always have to laugh when I see any post or article from the chief BBC Moscow propagandist Rosenberg. He simply cannot help himself from insisting on putting some anti-Russia, anti-Putin spin on everything. In this instance he mentions Moscow’s Kiev Railway Station, and he has to call it ‘Kyiv Railway Station’. Which it absolutely will not be called in Russia. Bless him. He gets more ridiculous by the day.

    Reply
    1. jsn

      Bagdad Bob benefited from a quick collapse.

      Clowns like Rosenberg have to keep at it year after year.

      Bobs still around, he’s 83. Here’s to long life on the losing side!

      Reply
    2. El Slobbo

      As a child studying Ukrainian, when we were writing in English we wrote Kiev and pronounced it in the Anglicized version of the Russian pronunciation, on the basis that this is how it works in English. Kyiv popped up out of nowhere a few years ago, along with journalists mangling that pronunciation just as badly as they mangled Kiev previously.
      It’s a sign of a failing political system when the professional busybodies of that country decide it should be their priority to change how English is spoken. “The Ukraine” versus “Ukraine” being another example. So now I make a point of saying “the Ukraine” in front of these people.

      Reply
      1. Polar Socialist

        Best part of the whole thing is that it’s just different transliteration: it’s really hard to hear the difference in pronunciation.

        Reply
  3. Louis Fyne

    >>>>Joe Biden says he is ‘passing the torch’ to save US democracy FT

    I totally forgot that Biden campaigned for singe-payer health care in the 2020 primaries.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/medicare-for-all/

    I wonder if part of the DNC consultancy blob realizes that they bait-switched voters so many times on policy that that only have the “save Democracy” and a few culture war cards left.

    …so Kamala isn’t even going to bother feigning interest in health care.

    Reply
    1. none

      One of Fox News’s attacks on Harris is that she co-sponsored a single payer bill back in the day. I’d count that in her favor except oops, it was apparently performative.

      Reply
    2. Pat

      The saving Democracy thing is evermore threadbare. At some point even the most rah rah not in the inner circle is going to recognize that the Democratic Party actively limits voter choice.

      Reply
      1. ilsm

        They are saving rights of minors to get sex change, abortion to term, and right to censor/gaslight anybody that don’t agree.

        The saving “ our “democracy is more like what Mao’s Red Guard might force.

        Reply
    3. marym

      Your link says he “prefers a public option.” That isn’t Medicare for All.

      As we learned in 2009 the “public option” is a proposal to deflect attention from M4A and to preserve private for-profit insurance.

      In 2020 when asked if he would sign a M4A bill if it somehow got through Congress his response was blah-blah-blah reasons why that was unlikely.

      Link

      Reply
      1. Safety First

        It was worse than that. Back in 2020, he all but said that he would veto a M4A bill if it ever “by some miracle” came to his desk. See: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/10/biden-says-he-wouldd-veto-medicare-for-all-as-coronavirus-focuses-attention-on-health.html – Pepperidge Farm remembers…

        In fact, I personally seem to recollect he actually said he’d veto it in one of the debates, but that kind of a quote requires more effort to chase down. And notice in that CNBC article his opposition is built around the “cost”, as in, quote, “where are you going to find $35 trillion”. Which was the main attack line of mainstream Democrats, “how’re you going to pay for it”, and that one was definitely used in the primary debates. Generating endless rebuttals on “progressive” Youtube channels, for all the good that did. It’s a mindbogglingly stupid attack line, of course, but certainly worked on the PMCs in the room.

        Point is, Biden, Klobuchar, all those “mainstream” candidates, they never even pretended during the primaries, they were dead against M4A or anything close to it. Kamala, at least, did a yo-yo deal where she raised her hand in favour of M4A in an early debate, then walked it back in interviews the next day. Meaning, she just wanted votes, and was willing to say anything in the moment to try and get them. In this sense, Biden was, ironically, the more principled one during the primaries (aside from lying a lot, as in his one on one debate vs Sanders).

        Reply
  4. zagonostra

    >Biden sidesteps hard truths in first speech since quitting race BBC

    While he said his accomplishments, which he listed in detail, merited a second term in office, he added that “nothing can come in the way of saving our democracy – and that includes personal ambition.”

    There is an excellent summary of Jacques Ellul’s political philosophy at the link below. In it, it states that Democracy is an illusion, and until it is recognized as such, that the reality of “democracy,” in a technological modern society, a mass society, is impossible. Nothing will improve the conditions of the masses as long as this illusion holds sway. He points out that the more politicians talk about “democracy” and “saving” it, the more distance in realty are the conditions which would allow it to become possible.

    Summary of The Political Illusion by Jacques Ellul

    https://youtu.be/69svN4b4cW0?si=EmwRTSzqOetu240A

    Reply
  5. zagonostra

    >39% of Americans worry they can’t pay the bills CNN

    As a result of current economic conditions, most Americans say they’ve had to cut back on spending on extras and entertainment (69%) and changed their grocery buying (68%), according to the CNN poll.

    Yesterday when I went to buy some creamer for my coffee, the price of the one that doesn’t have a paragraph of ingredients was north of $6.00. I can afford it, but I didn’t buy it.

    Some prices are now so high that I’ve changed my buying habits. Maybe it’s being raised in a household where there wasn’t much discretionary income. Some grocery items are so high that I refuse to buy them. I drank my coffee black in the past, and I drank it black this morning. I’m curious what the producers of some of these items are going to do when people just stop buying them.

    Reply
    1. earthling

      The grocery chains are well aware this is happening, and they are responding. Some prices which were jacked up too far too fast have already started coming down.

      In other cases, their solution is the usual tactic, to force you to buy more than you want. Major potato chips came down to 2 for $6 instead of 6 for one bag, because people were walking away. They still insist on getting $6 from you, which if you do that leaves less cash for other inflated goods in the store. I chose 0 for $0, like you did.

      And their favorite new trick is to offer great deals to people who agree to walk around the store using their phone app. A lot of young people are broke enough and submissive enough to agree to this.

      Reply
      1. GC54

        Hmm, chains here post “2 for $6″(yes sometimes requiring use of data-sucking store card/app), but when you buy 1 only it rings up as $3.

        Reply
  6. Mikerw0

    Olympics and COVID, say it ain’t so. My god these people either highly naive or just don’t give a sh*t as long as they can it was a success. Which they will regardless.

    Just look at what happened with the Tour de France. COVID was everywhere. Riders started to mask again, to protect themselves, even before they reimposed pretty weak masking rules. At the Tour is outside.

    Anyone wanna bet that athletes will get it, spread it, drop out, etc.?

    Reply
    1. Trees&Trucks

      Success of an olympics is measured in the velocity of money and the speed of filling coffers of insiders.

      IOC have at least 70 words for money.

      Reply
    2. britzklieg

      I will be tempted to watch some track and field events but hopefully my decision to not watch, a small and insignificant boycott as it were, will hold. I admire fine athletes but sorry guys and gals, the Olympics is a fraud and has been for a long time.

      Reply
      1. Wukchumni

        In the winter Olympics, its pretty much all about sticking the landing and i’m sure a lot of that goes on in the Olympic Village in indoor mixed double competition in the summer games, but it only seems to matter in gymnastics, diving and javelin events.

        Reply
  7. Wukchumni

    It’s a world of slaughter
    A world of tears
    It’s a world of hopes
    And a world of fears
    There’s so much that we’d rather not share
    That it’s time we’re aware
    It’s a small country after all

    It’s a small country after all
    It’s a small country after all
    It’s a small country after all
    It’s a small, small country

    There is just one chosen people who loom
    They need more living room
    And a Merkava means
    Foreclosure to ev’ryone
    Though the dogma divide
    And to think we could live by the tide
    Instead of side by side
    It’s a small country after all

    It’s a small country after all
    It’s a small country after all
    It’s a small country after all
    It’s a small, small country

    Reply
    1. griffen

      Given the music from Queen a spin this morning, whilst I file my daily TPS reports…all in the name of putting forth my effort for the good of humanity of course. If I don’t fulfill my daily tasks and deliverables, will anyone actually notice? Eh, probably not for one day…but I digress.

      Their tune for Under Pressure could really be an applicable track for our modern America and an election year that presents varied but bleak options. Biden vs Trump! Eh just a sec…Harris ( presumed ) vs Trump. “Our Democracy!” Vs. “Orange Man + MAGA”!!

      Reply
  8. DJG, Reality Czar

    Patrick Lawrence, the Wreckage Biden Leaves. I recommend this article to you, brethren and sistren. It may seem like doom and gloom, but it is lucid and well argued. Now, it may be that Lawrence can more easily pile up the record of Biden’s personal and political failures than find something to praise him for. Biden as a moral disaster is easy pickings. And we can all say nice things at the wake.

    Being a writer of wide culture, Lawrence makes these insights: “Biden took office four Januarys ago — remember the inauguration, with that dreadful poet and Garth Brooks bursting out of his jeans? — droning on and on about his dedication to national unity. Forget it. That was one of his more outsized Bidenisms. Joe Biden has put this nation so at odds with itself that he and his flaks have resorted to blaming it on the Russians, the Chinese and lately even the Iranians.”

    And he is right, down to the hysteria about the Iranians and the sermonizing poetaster. (I don’t want to crap on another writer, but have you noticed her disappearance?)

    Like alpha lyman blob, I do not eat popcorn. And I will defer by not passing the vitello tonnato today.

    Pass the dakos!

    Reply
    1. griffen

      I concur that is a must read and thankful he keeps it fairly tight, a nice summation of the Biden legacy. Many voters would find something to trifle with I’m certain. Look at his Cabinet, so diverse and reflection of America today….yeah about Pete Buttigieg or Secretary Mayorkas, just two examples where measured incompetence does not appear a deterrent in their ongoing roles. At times the sheer idiocy of the Biden administration public statements of policy wins and a great man legacy from the media are just overwhelming in the blind cheering. I’ll concede lowering the price level of insulin is a worthwhile effort. Or the proverbial or supposed fight against monopoly as well.

      I’ll take a beer and some potato chips…if those items are available on a sale price for a comparative bargain of course.

      Reply
  9. DJG, Reality Czar

    Aha.

    Private equity. Greed is good.

    Gecko (although an awfully cute one from Crete)

    Subtle.

    Reply
    1. griffen

      I shed crocodile tears whilst playing a tiny violin for the greedy bastards of private equity. They’re only smart from all the winning, just always winning, but their loss* column only appears to be vacant, since we’re aware that any loss hits someone else (limited partners, pension plans) or the bankruptcy courts.

      The economic pain of any past, present or future loss is due to unforeseen changes in the economy or in government policy. Nevermind a stacked deck, that typically features heavy fees ( oversight , management, bonuses ) plus newly generated debts.

      Reply
    1. .Tom

      The US Congress won the Olympic Gold Medal in Brown Nosing. Or is their discipline Lobby Transaction Processing?

      Reply
      1. John

        Simply notice that the emperor’s new clothes are his skivvies and he is trimmed to his true dimensions. I know. I know. Money.Votes. AIPAC. Congress critters are essentially herd beasts. Sheeple. Supporting Israel does not mean approval of each and every action, each and every attitude. I saw this morning that as a courtesy visiting dignitaries have their clothes cleaned. Can it be true that Bibi and wife always bring suitcases full of dirty clothes? Would that not be an extreme of passive aggression? Your host is fit only to wash your dirty socks? But then Bibi appears to be that arrogant at the best of times.

        Reply
  10. timbers

    NATO Grapples With a New Long Game Against Putin Foreign Policy

    Anyone remember the Original Star Trek episode when, while traveling in deep space, the Enterprise enters a black floating blob? Upon entering, the blob begins sucking the energy out of every living and mechanical thing as it pulls it in closer to it’s center. And…the more they try reverse thrusters to get out, the greater and faster the pull towards the center becomes, and the faster they are drained of energy?

    Then someone suggest a different approach – use their engines to thrust TOWARDS the center. And it works – they begin to slow the march towards the center, and the drain on their energy slows.

    Every leader in The West might benefit from watching that Star Trek episode.

    Reply
    1. CA

      NATO Grapples With a New Long Game Against Putin…

      Again, thank you for the important comments about the increased estimate of Russian GDP by the World Bank. The estimate makes sense and I expect the IMF will agree. The point, however, is that Russian economic productivity has been significantly underestimated by G7 countries.

      Reply
  11. Wukchumni

    Had Hiroshima-like mushrooms yesterday afternoon over the High Sierra, and it seemed as if all hell was gonna break loose, so my buddy and I turned into Cloudchasers headed east into Sequoia NP, and by the time we got to Giant Forest, they’d mostly dissipated into the ether.

    I’ll grant that it isn’t the same gig as chasing tornadoes as all the action is turned around in that instead of coming down, massive columns of cloud reached 15,000 to 20,000 feet in the air.

    Reply
  12. zagonostra

    >Trump shooter studied JFK assassination – FBI

    Thomas Michael Crooks also managed to fly a drone around the rally site without being detected, Christopher Wray told Congress…

    Testifying before the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, Wray said that an FBI examination of Crooks’ computer revealed that he began researching the JFK assassination on July 6, the same day he registered to attend the Trump rally.

    “He did a Google search for – quote – ‘how far away was Oswald from Kennedy’,” Wray said, referring to Lee Harvey Oswald, the gunman accused of shooting Kennedy in 1963.

    You have to appreciate Chutzpah of the FBI linking Crooks with Oswald, two lone gun men…yeah.

    https://www.rt.com/news/601609-trump-shooter-jfk-fbi/

    Reply
    1. .Tom

      I guess the FBI hues to the official account like so many other implausible official narratives we hear almost daily. So yeah, two gun men acting alone.

      In considering Crooks’ motives, I have to assume, unlike Oswald, suicide was one. Matt Farwell talks and writes about suicide by cop being a frequent choice of method among former service men. Crooks wasn’t in the services ofc but it does seem like a suicide by cop, among other things.

      Reply
  13. Wukchumni

    Our dad offered us each a grandido circa 1972 if we won an Olympic gold medal, and needless to say none of us collected the moolah, although I went to high school with somebody a grade higher who won an Olympic gold medal in Montreal when she was 16, as an honorable mention.

    Fast forward to the mid 1980’s and I was at an auction in London and was the successful bidder on a 1908 London Olympics gold medal (18k, not the gold-plated junk they give out nowadays) that was awarded for pigeon shooting. (I sincerely hope said pigeons were of the clay variety)

    I got home and drove over to my parents house and practically demanded the thousand bucks from Daddy Warbucks, but it was a no go, as I tested positive for cannabis.

    Reply
      1. Wukchumni

        I wouldn’t claim that Jill Sterkel looked manly like say an East German distaff swimmer in 1976, but she was certainly no shrinking violet.

        Reply
  14. Alice X

    >Branko Marcetic – An Untold History of Joe Biden’s Support for Israel

    A worthwhile survey, I would add to his account of old dreadful Joe in his support for the brutal 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon (a holocaust using Reagan’s own term).

    Jeremy Scahill April 27, 2021: [emphasis added]


    1982: Israeli Invasion of Lebanon

    In public, Joe Biden tried to claim neutrality on the Israeli military campaign. In private, he was more enthusiastic about it than the Israeli prime minister.

    In public, Joe Biden was neither a public cheerleader for nor an opponent of Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon. But in a private meeting of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee with Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin in June 1982, Biden appeared to support the brutality of the invasion even more than the Israeli government. As Biden’s colleagues “grilled” Begin over Israel’s disproportionate use of force, including by targeting civilians with cluster bomb munitions, Begin said Biden “rose and delivered a very impassioned speech” defending the invasion. Begin said he was shocked at how passionately Biden supported Israel’s invasion when Biden “said he would go even further than Israel, adding that he’d forcefully fend off anyone who sought to invade his country, even if that meant killing women or children.” Begin said, “I disassociated myself from these remarks,” adding: “I said to him: No, sir; attention must be paid. According to our values, it is forbidden to hurt women and children, even in war. Sometimes there are casualties among the civilian population as well. But it is forbidden to aspire to this. This is a yardstick of human civilization, not to hurt civilians.” The comments were striking from Begin, who had been notorious as a leader of the Irgun, a militant group that carried out some of the worst acts of ethnic cleansing accompanying the creation of the state of Israel, including the 1948 Deir Yassin massacre. The details of his exchange with Biden about Lebanon did not receive attention in the U.S. press. Instead, the New York Times focused on what it termed the “bitterest exchange” between Biden and Begin over the issue of Israeli settlements, which Biden opposed because, he said, it was hurting Israel’s reputation in the U.S.

    Doubly ironic, no? In 2018 Israeli snipers shot children in the knees, now they shoot them in the head. Biden got what he wanted after all.

    Reply
  15. Captain Obvious

    U.S. military representative will serve as an advisor in Armenia’s Ministry of Defense JAM News

    The title should say:
    Armenia’s Ministry of Defense will serve U.S. military representative.

    P.S. Link is not working properly because of “\” at its end.

    Reply
  16. John Beech

    Yves, how is this not a Ponzi scheme? As I understand the term, new money pays off old, but this Bloomberg article describes PE doing exactly this; shuttling around debts to sell for meeting new obligations! What am I missing? Who regulates PE? What protections do investors have, lawsuits and futile attempts to recover from modern day incarnation of three-card monte?

    Reply
  17. sarmaT

    Rheinmetall officially receives order from Ukraine to build ammunition factory Ukrainska Pravda

    The project is expected to commence in the short term, with ammunition production slated to start within 24 months.

    Two years. 😁

    Reply
  18. Wukchumni

    A Belgium visitor walking into the Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes in Death Valley National Park severely burned his feet when he lost his shoes, according to a park release.

    While the air temperature when the unidentified man headed into the dunes last weekend was around 123° Fahrenheit, park staff said “the ground temperature would have been much hotter…”

    According to the release, the man had to be rescued “after suffering full-thickness burns on his feet.”

    The man’s family called for help and recruited other park visitors who carried the man to the parking lot.

    Park rangers determined the man needed to be transported to a hospital quickly due to his burns and pain level. Mercy Air’s helicopter was not able to safely land in Death Valley due to extreme temperatures, which reduce rotor lift. Park rangers transported the man in an ambulance to a landing zone at higher elevation, where the temperature was 109°F, and the man was flown to University Medical Center in Las Vegas.

    Rangers were not able to determine if his flip flops broke or were lost in sand.

    https://www.nationalparkstraveler.org/2024/07/hot-sand-burns-mans-feet-death-valley-national-park
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    The Shoe Is The Sign from Life of Brian

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ka9mfZbTFbk

    Reply
  19. .Tom

    > Rheinmetall officially receives order from Ukraine to build ammunition factory Ukrainska Pravda

    I assume RF can, if it chooses, prevent production from the factory. So what is this? More transfers of money to Western arms makers?

    We know that sending military equipment to be destroyed in UA serves that purpose because US politicians boast about it so it doesn’t seem a stretch that this is the same kind of thing.

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